It's All Downhill from Here

by P. J. Night

  “Old Man Wharton,” Maggie said without hesitation. “His ghost.”

  “Are you still going on about that?” Simon asked. “I don’t know who the guy was.”

  Maggie fished in her pocket and pulled out her cell phone.

  “Who ya gonna call, Mags?” Simon said, smiling for a moment at his little joke. “You know there’s no cell service up here.”

  “I’m not calling anyone,” she said, frantically scrolling through all the pictures she had stored on her camera.

  “Was it this old guy, Simon?” Maggie asked, shoving the phone into Simon’s face. “This is the picture I took of the face in the window. It’s gotta be the ghost of Old Man Wharton.”

  He squinted at the glowing image, and his face turned pale.

  “That’s him!” he cried. “I couldn’t make it out the first time you showed it to me, but now that I know what I’m looking for, I can see the face—his face, the face of the man who pushed me!”

  Maggie felt an enormous sense of relief. Not only had she found her brother, but he now knew what she and Sophie knew: This house, this property, was haunted by the ghost of Old Man Wharton. She hugged Simon tightly.

  “I don’t mean to break up this little celebration, but what about your parents?” Sophie asked.

  “Can you see if they’re home?” Simon asked.

  “I don’t see any movement in the house,” Sophie said, looking down the hill.

  A few minutes later they reached the base of the mountain. At that moment they spotted headlights pulling into the driveway.

  “Mom and Dad are home!” Maggie cried. “We are so busted!”

  Chapter 11

  “Hurry!” Maggie urged. “We can make it! Come on!”

  “No way!” Sophie cried. “We’re gonna run into them at the front door!”

  “That’s why we’re going through the back door!”

  Running as quickly as they could through the snow, Maggie, Sophie, and Simon raced around to the back of the mansion. Bursting into the house through the back door, they threw off their snow-encrusted coats, hats, and gloves, and yanked off their heavy boots.

  “They’ll know we were out in the snow when they see this pile of stuff,” Simon worried, hopping on one foot, struggling to pull his boot off.

  “So, we went out for a snowball fight, that’s all!” Maggie replied.

  When their snowy jackets and boots had all been shed, they dashed into the living room.

  Sophie lit several candles. Maggie tossed a magazine to Simon and picked another up for herself.

  Footsteps sounded near the front door.

  “Simon!” Maggie cried, pointing at her brother. “Your clothes!”

  “What?” he asked, looking down at his signature ski outfit. “Oh.” He bounded up the stairs just as the front door swung open.

  “Hey, gang, we’re home!” Mr. Kim announced.

  “Sorry we’re late,” Mrs. Kim added as she and her husband took off their coats. “The roads are getting very slippery with all this snow. It took us over an hour to get back from town.”

  “Hope you guys weren’t too bored, just sitting around here all day,” Mr. Kim said.

  “We’re okay, Dad,” Maggie said, offering no details and certainly no clues as to the adventure they had just survived.

  “Where’s Simon?” Mrs. Kim asked.

  “Right here, Mom,” Simon said, walking slowly down the stairs, wearing his pajamas. He rubbed his eyes.

  Maggie and Sophie exchanged a look.

  “I must have dozed off,” Simon lied. “What time is it anyway?”

  “Time for great news!” Mr. Kim exclaimed, unable to keep his excitement hidden any longer. “The bank approved our loan. It’s official—we’re going to buy this place!”

  “It’s all downhill from here,” said Mrs. Kim, hoping her little joke would help get the kids excited about the news. “Smooth sailing. The hard part is done.”

  No one said a word. Even Simon stared down at his feet.

  “Well, don’t everyone get too excited,” Mr. Kim said, shaking his head. “Is everything all right here? Did something happen today?”

  Simon looked up. “What do you mean?” he asked nervously.

  “Well, Simon, I thought you, at least, would be happy about this,” Mr. Kim explained. “This means that once we fix up the slopes, you’ll be able to ski anytime you want. I figured you’d be jumping for joy.”

  Simon looked over at Maggie and Sophie. Even though he still wasn’t sure there was a ghost, he now believed that someone—or something—was trying to scare his family away. But he certainly couldn’t tell his parents about the events that had led to his discovery.

  “I don’t know, Dad,” he began, his mind racing to come up with some kind of excuse. “I guess now that it’s real, I feel a little overwhelmed.”

  “Look, I know this is going to be a big change for you, for all of us,” Mr. Kim said sympathetically. “But opportunities like this don’t come around every day. Just give it a chance.”

  “What choice do I have?” Maggie asked, pointing out the obvious.

  “I’ll start dinner,” Mrs. Kim said, heading for the kitchen.

  “I’ll help,” Mr. Kim added, sighing deeply. “Let’s leave the Gloomy Guses to themselves.”

  When they had left the room, Simon leaned in close to Maggie. “I have to tell you, Mags,” he began, speaking softly so his parents couldn’t hear. “When you started with all this ghost stuff and disappearing candles and writing in the snow, I thought you were just being a brat. But now I believe something is going on.”

  “The question is, what are we going to do about it?” Maggie replied. “Even though we all now believe that there’s a ghost here, Mom and Dad will never believe us.”

  “I’m scared to spend one more night here,” Sophie said. “And the thought of you guys living here all the time . . .” Her words trailed off.

  “I thought you were just being difficult before,” Simon continued. “But after what just happened to me, I have to agree with you. I think that buying this house would be the worst idea ever.”

  “What did happen to you?” Sophie asked.

  “I got up to the top of the hill just fine. As soon as I put on my skis, I felt a pair of hands shove me in the back. I wasn’t ready at all. I was in no position to speed down such a steep hill. That takes preparation, proper form, and complete concentration. My point is that someone pushed me. As I sped away, I twisted around. I could make out the face of an old man, smiling.”

  “Old Man Wharton,” Maggie said.

  “It must be,” Simon agreed. “When I got to the bottom of the hill, my skis must have been broken. I probably wandered into that shed, dazed from everything, and then he locked me in.”

  “What’s to stop him from really hurting us?” Maggie wondered aloud. She looked right at Simon. “By attacking you, he’s shown us that he’s capable of violent action, not just pranks. I’m with Sophie—I don’t want to stay here another night.”

  Sophie added, “Especially since your parents just announced to everyone here—living or dead—that they’re definitely buying the place. I’m on pins and needles that at any second the lights are going to go off again, or something will explode, or the house will catch on fire, or—”

  “What are we going to do about it?” Maggie asked. She leaned onto her backpack and felt something hard inside. Opening the flap, she pulled out the scrapbook she had snatched from the shed.

  Keeping one eye out for her parents, she slowly opened the dusty, battered cover.

  Old photos filled the book. Maggie recognized images of various rooms in the house, but mostly they were pictures of people she didn’t recognize.

  “Look at this,” she said. “Pages from a diary.”

  “What’s it say? Whose diary?” Sophie asked, peering over Maggie’s shoulder at the yellowed pages pasted into the scrapbook.

  Maggie began reading. “‘January 21, 1951. Watc
hed Samuel head off to the mountain, skis in hand, as usual. He seems to love skiing more now that he has become an adult.’ The rest is torn off.”

  “There’s that Samuel guy again!” said Sophie. “Ernest built the place, and Jonas is Old Man Wharton, the one who died and refuses to leave. But Samuel?”

  “Jonas’s brother!” Maggie said in an excited whisper that came out a bit louder than she had intended. “Look at this picture.”

  “Maggie, did you say something, dear?” Mrs. Kim called out from the kitchen.

  “Nothing, Mom.”

  “Dinner will be ready in about half an hour,” her mother continued.

  “Here’s a picture of Samuel Wharton,” Maggie said. “Look familiar, Soph?”

  “We saw a picture of this same guy in that storage room,” Sophie recalled. “Remember, in that pile of old photographs we saw?”

  “Exactly,” said Maggie. “And the portrait I saw at the entrance to the secret room, and all the other ones inside. And I’ll bet the photo that crashed to the floor was a picture of Jonas and Samuel.”

  “Um, did I miss something?” Simon asked. “What does this have to do with anything?”

  “I don’t know,” Maggie replied, flipping through the pages of the diary. “Here’s another entry.” They leaned over to read it together.

  March 28, 1955. Still a decent amount of snow on the mountain. Yet with the days growing longer and warmer as spring makes its approach, Samuel grows mournful, worrying that each day he sets out to ski might be his last for many months.

  He always dreads our return to the city for the summer; he misses the mountain so. And although I am getting too old for skiing, I am beginning to see why Samuel loves it so much. More often, it seems, I contemplate remaining here year round.

  This entry had a piece of a signature. It read Jona. The rest was smudged and torn.

  “Jonas!” Maggie cried.

  “What?” her dad called from the kitchen.

  “Nothing, Dad, we’re just playing a game,” Maggie replied.

  “Games are good!” came the response from the kitchen.

  “So that confirms it. This is Old Man Wharton’s scrapbook, complete with pages from his diary,” Maggie continued.

  “So that shed obviously was his private place!” Sophie commented, shaking her head. “He must have gone there to write in his diary.”

  Maggie kept flipping through the book. Pages and pages later she came to a brittle, yellowed newspaper clipping dated February 9, 1970, with a headline that read SAMUEL WHARTON DIES IN SKIING ACCIDENT.

  “Whoa!” Simon said, leaning in close to get a better look.

  Maggie read the article aloud. “‘Thirty-eight-year-old Samuel Wharton, a local skiing enthusiast and member of the prestigious Wharton family, died yesterday in a tragic skiing accident on family property. Mr. Wharton, who never married, is survived by his older brother, Jonas Wharton.’”

  Maggie and Sophie both turned to look at Simon. Maggie’s mind flashed back to the fact that her brother had just gone skiing on the same mountain where Samuel Wharton had died.

  “What?” he said defensively. “They had primitive equipment back then. Who knows what that Samuel dude was using. I—”

  Maggie threw her arms around Simon and hugged him tightly. She thought about the old ski equipment that had been arranged as a shrine in the secret room—obviously done by Jonas Wharton in memory of his dead brother.

  “Guys, look at this,” Sophie said urgently, flipping the scrapbook to the next page. “It’s Old Man Wharton’s diary, dated February 12, 1970, a few days after Samuel died.” They all peered over the book.

  It is with a heart full of burning grief that I put pen to paper. I buried Samuel today. It took every ounce of self-control to not climb into the grave with him.

  A part of me died today, as if I had lost a limb or a vital organ from my own body. Samuel was my beloved younger brother. I practically raised him, and he was all I had. There are no more relatives, none that speak to me or deem me worthy of a visit, at any rate. And as for friends, well, I have scant use for them anymore.

  I can scarcely breathe, as if all the oxygen in the world was buried beside dear Samuel. One thing is for certain. No one will ever ski on my mountain again. Not for any reason.

  I fear these may be the last words I ever record, regardless of how long my now-meaningless life drags on.

  - Jonas Wharton.

  The signature was clear this time, as if it had just been written yesterday.

  “Well, that explains a lot,” Sophie said. “He became a bitter, solitary hermit of a man, consumed by his grief and loneliness. Rotting here all alone.”

  “Samuel’s death must be the ‘incident’ Ms. Walcott mentioned. The one that made Jonas close the slopes,” Maggie said. “And that’s why he didn’t want this place turned into a ski lodge. And apparently he’ll do whatever he feels is necessary, including not resting in peace, to make sure that doesn’t happen.”

  She flipped the scrapbook to its final page.

  “It’s him!” she cried, pointing at a photo.

  The last page of the scrapbook was covered by a large photo of an old man. It was labeled JONAS WHARTON.

  “That’s the face,” Maggie said, jumping up and backing away from the photo as if it might bite her. “That’s the face of the man I saw in the window the night we arrived!”

  “And that’s the man who pushed me down the mountain!” Simon added.

  “If we had any doubt left, this nails it down,” Sophie said, staring at the photo. “We are absolutely dealing with an angry ghost!”

  “That’s it!” Maggie cried as softly as she could.

  “That’s what?” Simon asked, truly puzzled.

  “We deal with the angry ghost!”

  “How do we do that?” Sophie asked, looking back over her shoulder, half expecting the ghost of Old Man Wharton to pounce at any moment.

  “We hold a séance,” Maggie explained.

  Simon hesitated. “I don’t know . . .”

  “You have a better idea?” Maggie shot back.

  Simon and Sophie looked at Maggie and then shrugged.

  “Okay, I’m in,” Sophie said.

  “Me too,” Simon agreed. “I’d like to tell him that pushing people down mountains is definitely not cool!”

  “We’ve got to be fast,” Maggie pointed out. “Dinner will be ready soon.”

  The three kids went to the library and shut the door. This way they’d be close to Jonas’s secret room and far enough away from their parents in the kitchen. They sat in a circle on the floor. They placed the scrapbook containing Jonas Wharton’s diary in the center of their little circle.

  “I read somewhere that if you’re trying to contact a spirit, using one of his possessions can help make the connection,” Maggie explained.

  Then they all grasped hands and closed their eyes.

  “Jonas Wharton, we summon you to join us in our circle,” Maggie began. “We are truly sorry for your loss and don’t wish to cause you any further pain. We know what happened to Samuel. The loss of a brother is a horrible thing to bear. I almost lost my own brother today because you went too far. I’m sure you don’t want history to repeat itself, do you?”

  Silence filled the room. After a few seconds, Simon spoke.

  “Jonas, as the one you could have killed, I ask you to communicate with us,” he began. “The reason you tried to stop me from skiing is so that no one can build a ski resort here, so that no one else had to die like Samuel. So why did you try to—”

  Simon stopped short and began to make noises that sounded as if he were choking. His eyes closed and his head fell back.

  “Simon!” Sophie whispered. “Are you okay?”

  She began to pull her hand away from Maggie’s, but Maggie held on tight. “Wait!” Maggie said. “Look!”

  Simon’s head rolled back into an upright position. His eyes opened, revealing only the whites. His mouth trem
bled; then a voice, not his own, emerged.

  “I cannot allow anyone to ski here ever again,” said the deep, echoing voice coming from Simon’s mouth.

  Maggie shook her brother’s shoulder. “Simon? Simon?”

  “Do not allow skiing here, or more will die!” the deep voice continued.

  “Do you mean that they’ll die skiing or that you, Jonas Wharton, will kill them?” Sophie asked.

  “Do not allow skiing here, or more will die!” Jonas repeated.

  “Nobody wants what happened to Samuel to happen—”

  “Do not speak that name!” Jonas roared in a voice that filled the room.

  “We can’t reason with him,” Sophie said. “And I’m getting scared that he’s hurting Simon again.”

  “Do you intend to harm my brother?” Maggie asked. “I love him like you loved Samuel.”

  “DO NOT SPEAK THAT NAME!” Jonas shouted.

  Simon’s body started twitching wildly.

  “We’ve got to remove Jonas’s spirit from Simon’s body!” Sophie said. “Let go of my hand—maybe breaking the circle will do it.”

  Maggie let go of Sophie’s hand on one side and Simon’s on the other, but Simon kept twitching.

  “It’s not working!” Sophie cried softly.

  Then Maggie got an idea. She grabbed Jonas Wharton’s scrapbook, ran down the hallway, across the room, opened the front door, and tossed it out into the snow.

  By the time she made it back to the library, Simon had stopped twitching. His head dropped to his chest. Then he raised his head and opened his eyes.

  “What just happened?” he asked, clearly himself again, no longer hosting a ghost.

  “You were possessed by Jonas Wharton!” Maggie explained, glad that the removal of Wharton’s personal item had freed Simon.

  “No way!” Simon said, shaking his head and rubbing his eyes. “What’d I, um, he say?”

  But there was no time to explain. “Dinner’s ready, everyone!” Mrs. Kim shouted from the kitchen.

  “It’s now or never,” Maggie said determinedly. “We have got to convince them, once and for all, not to buy this house!”